Golden Cage
by Invaluable
Summary: During the final battle against Voldemort, Harry dissapears and finds himself stuck in a room with a very different Tom Riddle. Very light HarryxTom.


A/N: Something I wrote a while back for Wendy. I rather liked how it came out and then later Wendy wrote a sequel to it, which was amazing. So yeah. Enjoy.

Golden Cage

Harry couldn't remember too much before the room, only a battlefield. It was littered with bodies and he thought that maybe it was raining. If he had had time to think, he would have thought that maybe the setting was overly dramatic, but he didn't have time to think because suddenly, there _he_ was.

He looked exactly the same as he always did, all red eyes and fangs, and that suited Harry fine because it was much easier to kill a monster than it was to kill a human being, not that Harry had ever thought of Voldemort as a human being.

Then, maybe more suddenly, there Ron was and before Harry could blink, there he wasn't, because there had been a flash of green light and Ron had fallen. It seemed to take forever for him to fall, for the back of his head to hit the muddy grass. And then his eyes were looking back at Harry, light blue and lifeless, and before he even knew what he was doing, he was on top of Voldemort, and his wand was lying a few feet away, but that was okay because so was Voldemort's. All Harry could think was that this wasn't the way it was supposed to go. Harry was supposed to take the horcrux and destroy it. Voldemort being there was just arrogance. He wanted the bastard to see when Harry killed him, but now he forgot about all that and all he was doing was pounding the Dark Lord's face in with his fists, one of which was still clutching the small locket which was the last horcrux.

His feet and teeth were doing things too, kicking and biting, and every bit of him was exuding so much hatred. He really couldn't believe how _easy_ it was, and he couldn't help but wonder about why he hadn't done this before, but he couldn't stop to think about that because the Dark Lord was bleeding and his blood was black, like the blood of the Black Plague.

And then, suddenly, the way things seemed to be happening lately, there was no Dark Lord, and there was no battlefield, and there was no blood running down his knuckles. Instead there was a ceiling and a pair of bright green eyes looking down at him in concern. At least, he thought they were eyes because Harry couldn't see well out of his own eyes. Everything was just a blur of colors.

"Oh, sorry," said a voice, a voice that sounded awfully familiar and that Harry didn't even try to place. "Here you are," and a pair of glasses were pushed onto his face. Harry had to blink a few times to make sure they were working properly because he could have _sworn_ that that was Tom Riddle looking down at him, a faint smile playing on his lips, and before Harry knew what he was doing, he leaped out of bed and pounced on Tom Riddle, who was all smooth, white skin and green eyes and dark hair. He fought again because fighting was much easier than admitting that Voldemort was there in front of him and he was looking much more human than he had ever looked, even in Dumbledore's pensieve, but he didn't think about that either because thinking of Dumbledore was painful.

Of course, he wasn't fighting for long, because this Voldemort was much swifter, and maybe a bit stronger than the Voldemort he had been fighting a minute ago. In one move he had managed to push Harry off of him and hold him down while holding his hands behind his back. He did this so quickly that one second, Harry was punching Tom Riddle's gut, and the next he was unable to punch at all.

"Now, now, is that any way to treat the person who nursed you back to health?"

If Harry had been confused before, it was nothing to what he was now. What Harry wanted to do was turn around and continue with his Voldemort ass-kicking, but since he was currently sitting on top of Harry and pushing his face down against the cold floor while pinning his arms behind his back, Harry was forced to sit still. A bead of sweat rolled down his temple and into his eyes making him squint and his eye water. He tried to think of some plan of escape, some way to get Riddle off of him and find out what was going on.

Of course, he wouldn't allow himself to think about _why_ Riddle was here or where exactly _here_ was to begin with, and adding to the list of things he wouldn't allow himself to think about, he decided not to think about that line. _Now, now, is that any way to treat the person who nursed you back to health? _Because, honestly, he had enough to think about without having to think what that was supposed to mean.

"Alright, Tom," he said, trying not to say Voldemort, and trying not to sound as though he wasn't scared to death, and quite unexpectedly, as if those had been the magic words, Riddle jumped off him and backed into a corner.

"H-how did you know my name?" but Harry didn't worry about answering his question because as soon as he was free, he got up and looked around the room for a way out.

The room was, to put it simply, a mess. Clothes were strewn about everywhere, as where dirty dishes, and bits of paper. However, under the mess, Harry could tell that it really was beautiful. The few bits of furniture were all covered in green velvet and the ceiling and floors were decorated with golden angels. In the center of the room was the four-poster bed that Harry had been lying in. On the other side of the room was a doorway that led to the bathroom. The room seemed pretty ordinary, if ornate, the only thing missing was a door, a door that led to a hallway or a staircase, for Harry could see through the window beside the bed that they were very high up, probably in a tower of some sort.

"_Tell me_!" said Riddle and he was sounding much more afraid than he should have been because even when he was a little boy in an orphanage being visited by a strange old man, he was still more defiant than anything else.

"Tell you what?" snapped Harry angrily, annoyed by his inability to find some way out and by Riddle's tone of voice.

"_How do you know my name_?" he hissed, his teeth clenched. And what could Harry say to that? The truth, he supposed, but suddenly, things weren't making very much sense and he thought that maybe if he mentioned basilisks and anagrams, he wouldn't really be saying much. So instead he opted for asking his own questions instead.

"Where am I? Did you bring me here? How do I get out? I need to-" No, he couldn't _say_ that he was going to destroy Voldemort, just in case.

"Who are you?" So Riddle was going to play his same game, was he?

"Harry Potter." Riddle didn't seem so nervous anymore. It seemed that now that Harry had a name, he couldn't have been a threat to him. Now, Harry wasn't some mystical creature. Now, he was just a boy with slightly crooked glasses and a threatened stance. So, giving off an air of apathy, yet still not taking his eyes off Harry, he sat on the bed and motioned for Harry to move closer, but Harry did no such thing. He still wasn't taking his chances with Tom Riddle, no matter what he seemed.

"Look- Harry, was it? - I don't know how you got here or what you know about me, but I do know one thing. There's no way out. I've been here for almost as long as I can remember, and I've never found a way out." There was something quiet in his voice, something unexpected, but Harry ignored it. He didn't have time to be thinking about Tom Riddle's feelings.

"There has to be," said Harry stubbornly, because honestly, how did he get here if it wasn't through a door?

"There isn't," and, as though he had read his thoughts, "like you, for example, you just fell from the ceiling and onto the bed, on top of me, in fact," he said and almost smiled. Then, Harry had an idea.

"What about-" but could he really ask this? Could he really ask it without arising suspicion in Riddle? Or without endangering him even more? Either way, it was a chance he would have to take. "What about a locket? When I 'fell from the ceiling,' did I have a locket in my hand?" He tried not to sound desperate, not to let Riddle know that this was his last hope, his very last because at the very least, if he was stuck here forever, he could make sure that Voldemort would be destroyed. Riddle was quiet for a long time. It was as though he knew that Harry's self-worth depended on whether or not he had the locket. No, it was more than that. It was as though he cared.

"No," he said finally. "It was just you, your clothes, your crooked glasses, and blood, a lot of it," and finding no response to this, Harry simply threw himself on the bed, face down. It didn't matter now. Even if Riddle had the locket and was lying to Harry, he was sure to have hidden it again. Everything Harry had worked for this past year, it was all for nothing. Voldemort would live, and Harry would be stuck in this tower forever. "I'm sorry," said Riddle, and even though Harry kept thinking, _this is Voldemort, the cause of all my anger, all my grief_, he also couldn't help but also think, _no, this is not Voldemort. This is just a boy who looks like him and shares his name. _When Harry stopped for a moment to think about it, to ponder the worried look in that boy's eyes when he had said his name, he knew that this was no monster. This was just a boy, in the same way he was just Harry.

"How old are you, Tom?" he asked, his words muffled by the mattress shielding his face from the world. He felt Riddle wince.

"Eleven, why?" _Eleven? _He really was just a boy. A little kid. A first year, by Hogwarts standards. _But he was still Tom Riddle,_ thought Harry fervently, and he should know, better than anyone, what Tom Riddle was capable of at any age. Yet, this didn't seem like the Tom Riddle he knew. This was a different Tom Riddle. Five minutes with him had made that exceedingly clear. Well, then who was he, exactly? He certainly looked like Tom Riddle, and he sounded like Tom Riddle, but there was something missing, something that Harry couldn't quite place.

"No reason."

"Look," said Riddle, sounding more serious than Harry had heard him so far. "I don't know who you are or why you're here, but you obviously know a few things I'd like to know, and I think I might know a couple of things that you'd like to know." Harry couldn't help but laugh at this.

"Yeah? What sort of things would I like to know?" asked Harry, curious despite himself. He turned on his side to look at Riddle, who was sitting cross-legged beside him.

"Well," he said, shrugging, "for instance, things about this place," and we waved vaguely with one hand about the room. "And well, _other_ things I know about." His eyes twinkled as though he was a child with some secret to reveal and really, Harry supposed that he was.

"Other things?" Harry raised an eyebrow. "What things?"

"Oh, no. I've already answered your question about the locket. Now you have to answer my question about how you know my name." At this, Harry ran a hand through his hair. He should have known that this would come up again. Well, he would explain it all as best he could.

"Well, I first found out who you are because-" Boy, this was harder to explain than he thought it would be. "You see," he sighed and looked down at the bedspread. "Well, do you know about the Chamber of Secrets?" Harry looked up again and saw that, indeed, Tom Riddle knew about the Chamber of Secrets. His eyes were as round as saucers and he was _stuttering_ when he spoke.

"Y-yes, I do, b-but how d-do you know a-about it? Do-do you also know about Hogwarts and," he paused, looking around as though anyone might catch him saying it and box his ears, "magic." Harry smiled, thinking of the Dursley's, of a life that now seemed so far away.

"Yeah, I know. I went to Hogwarts myself." If possible, his eyes widened even more.

"_You_?" Harry laughed again.

"Yes, me. Why? Don't I look like a wizard?"

"I-uh," he looked down at the covers and, to Harry's great surprise, he_ blushed._

"Forget it. You don't have to answer that," and he didn't. Harry noticed that they had gotten off the subject and decided to not bring the subject back. Riddle had apparently forgotten about it too because he was quiet for a long time.

When he finally did say something it was, "well, Harry, it looks like you'll be staying here for a while, and there's only one bed. I know you just woke up and all, but it's late already, so if you don't mind, I'd like to get to sleep." He was stumbling over his words and sounding more nervous than Harry could have thought possible.

Sleep? How could he even _think_ about sleep right now? Well, at least he had decided that Harry wasn't a threat to him or his existence. That was good; the more comfortable Riddle felt around him, the more Harry could get out of him. For a moment, something almost like guilt twisted inside him, but he reminded himself that while this may not be the Voldemort Harry knew, it was _some_ version of Voldemort.

So, once he'd made sure that Riddle's breathing was deep and even from sleep, Harry climbed off of the bed and went to searching about the room. The task was not an easy one, as things were thrown about all over the room, making it nearly impossible to walk, much less search for anything. Nevertheless, Harry looked under pants and papers for any sign of anything useful. Of course, he wasn't ready to completely believe Riddle about the locket, so he emptied drawers and wiggled his fingers in empty shirt pockets, and yet, the locket was no where to be found. It seemed Riddle was telling the truth about that, or he had hidden it somewhere impossible.

_Like outside this tower, for example_? Following this train of thought, he began to look for an exit. He knocked on the walls and even went into the spacious bathroom and looked for a way out from there. Unfortunately, after a few hours of that, he gave up on searching all together. Instead, he lay down in the empty bathtub, which was big enough to fit four people, and tried to think up some plan of action. He thought for what seemed like forever, and yet no brilliant idea came to him. He did not jump out of the bathtub screaming, "Eureka!" All that happened was that he got a pounding head ache. He cursed his luck and massaged his forehead.

"Harry?" He looked up abruptly to find Riddle standing in the doorway of the bathroom. He was rubbing his eyes and looking like a kid who had woken up in the middle of the night to find that everyone in the house had disappeared. "Why are you sleeping in the bathtub? You can share the bed with me if you want to sleep. I just thought-"

"I wasn't sleeping," mumbled Harry, though he _was_ beginning to feel a tad worn.

"Oh," said Riddle before turning around to return to his bed. "Is it just me or is everything a little messier than usual?" he muttered just within Harry's hearing.

Harry waited five minutes before getting up from the bathtub and following Riddle to the bed. He pretended not to notice that Riddle was only taking up half the bed and that a spare pillow was lying next to his head. There was only one blanket, but there was quite enough space for Harry to wriggle under it. He closed his eyes once again, and when he was in that place right before falling asleep, he could have sworn he heard Riddle whisper, "You know, Harry, even if you're a little odd, I'm still glad you came here. I was tired of being alone."

_Yes_, thought Harry, _so was I_, before falling into a deep sleep.

He didn't know when he had decided this, but it must have been sometime during the night, because when Harry woke up, he suddenly _knew_. He knew that there would be no escape from this tower or from Riddle. He knew there was no hope of ever destroying the last horcrux. He knew that this was the end for him, that he had to live out his days as best he could in this place.

There was one more thing he knew.

He knew that if he was going to stay here, there was absolutely no way the room could remain in the condition that it was in. So the next morning, or whatever counted as morning in this awful gray place, Harry cheerfully set about cleaning the place up. Of course, he ordered Riddle to help him, and while Riddle didn't exactly follow his orders, he could be seen folding up several pairs of pants and even washing a few dishes in the bathroom sink.

For the next few days, that was all they did. They didn't talk much, except for the occasional, "I put such-and-such thing in such-and-such drawer." It wasn't that Harry was some sort of neat freak, not by any stretch, but he did like to be able to see the floor from time to time. That and the menial labor kept his thoughts off other, more depressing subjects.

Only, once everything was tidied up, there was nothing to do but think or talk to Riddle, and considering where his mind wandered whenever he had a spare moment to think, Harry chose the latter.

"Where does the food come from?" asked Harry one day because he had found that food seemed to appear whenever he was hungry in the least likely of places. They were currently sitting on their bed enjoying a plateful of hot chicken and iced pumpkin juice which they had found under the bathroom sink. Riddle only shrugged.

"I don't know. I suppose it comes from the same place you did." He stopped to take another bite of chicken. "The same place all the clothes came from too," he said once he had swallowed, for Harry had also noticed a pile of clothing just his size at the foot of their bed the next morning. He kept wandering why a second bed didn't magically appear, but he didn't think too much on it.

"I don't think so," said Harry, pushing the plate away. He felt so full that he thought the button on his pants would soon pop off. He looked over at Riddle who was still eating. The boy could really pack away that food. It was a wonder that he didn't weigh three hundred pounds.

"Why not?"

Harry shrugged. "Just a feeling."

"Hey, Harry," said Riddle, throwing his half-eaten chicken leg back on his plate before letting himself fall back onto the bed, licking his greasy fingers.

"Yeah," said Harry, lying down next to Riddle.

"You know, before you came here, I would have given anything to leave this tower, but now, I'm not so sure. I like you, Harry. I like you a lot," he wrinkled his nose, "even if you're a bit bossy." Harry looked at him out of the corner of his eye. He didn't even _try_ to convince himself of anything this time. He raised a hand and ran it through Riddles hair before yanking on it, not too hard, just hard enough to annoy him.

"I'm _not_ bossy."

Riddle stuck his tongue out at him before grinning with shiny lips. Harry closed his eyes and muttered, "You're getting grease all over the bed." He felt Riddle shrug.

"I don't care." Harry's hand stayed resting in the other's hair.

The days passed on like this, until they were weeks and then months, and in order to avoid any thinking, they talked. They talked about all things imaginable and some things unimaginable. For some reason, when talking to Riddle, things never seemed to hurt as much as they usually did. So he told Riddle everything. He told him about his parents, and about the Dursleys, and about Hogwarts, which of course, Riddle already knew about. He told him about his adventures there, about all the sadness in his life and all the happiness too, though he never mentioned the Tom Riddle that became Lord Voldemort because Riddle seemed to hate Voldemort almost as much as Harry did. Time seemed to fly by them until Harry could have sworn that he had known Riddle forever.

Except that Harry didn't know anything about Riddle. He knew what he'd learned outside this tower, yes, but he hadn't learned anything from the boy himself. All he knew where his actions, the way sometimes, when Harry was sad and he was sitting in the one arm chair they shared, Riddle would crawl into his lap and hum some pretty song that soothed Harry's soul. He knew that when Harry was having a nightmare, he'd wake up shivering and covered in sweat and little Tom Riddle curled up against him, holding onto him as though their lives depended on it. He knew that when Riddle laughed, his nose would scrunch up and sometimes he'd snort. He knew that when he cried, he did so silently, just like Harry did because even though he claimed not to remember much about life before this room, he did remember some things, some horrors.

And these things, for Harry at least, were enough.

"I didn't have parents either," said Riddle one night that they lay together in their giant bed, lost inside the heap that was their blanket. Harry had been stroking his hair, which at first glanced seemed very similar to Harry's own, though it was in reality much softer and a little tamer. Riddle's face was buried in Harry's chest, so that his words were almost unintelligible. Harry made them out though.

"Do you know what happened to them?"

Riddle shook his head, but that was okay because Harry already knew that story and he didn't particularly want to hear it again.

"You never answered me, Harry," said Riddle quietly.

"About what?"

"About how you knew my name." Harry had known that it would come back to this, and he was prepared for the question. He held Riddle a little closer, lowering his face until it was lost inside Riddle's raven locks. He took a deep breathe, taking in his scent. How had he come to care for this boy so much that the mere thought of causing him pain was making Harry's head throb?

"I knew you, in the life I led before."

"Were we friends?" Harry could lie at this point. No one would know. Riddle wouldn't know, and he'd be happier if he didn't know the truth.

"No, we were horrible enemies." Riddle stiffened a little in his arms, but if anything, he held Harry closer, as though even talking about being his enemy would cause Harry to hate him.

"Like you and Malfoy?"

"No, worse enemies than that even."

"Like you and," he hesitated, though they both knew what he would say, "Voldemort?" And if Harry had gone this far without lying, he had to follow through now. That didn't mean, though, that he had to tell the whole truth.

"Yes, like me and Voldemort."

They were both quiet for a long time, and it was a while before Harry realized that Riddle was crying.

"What's wrong?" asked Harry, though he knew the answer to that already.

"You hate me, don't you?" Harry nearly smiled. He reached down and ran his knuckles Riddle's cheek before nudging his face up by his chin.

"I think it's impossible for me to hate you. In fact, I've grown too attached to you to be able to manage even a little dislike." Riddle blinked the tears out of his eyes.

"Really?"

"Yeah, really."

Riddle wiped his face with the back of his hand before continuing. "And do you think you might even love me?" Harry considered this for a moment.

"Yes, I do think I love you." Riddle smiled up at him, his eyes shining.

"Good," he said, closing his eyes, "because I think I love you too," and with that, they slept.

_Hermione had lost everything she had to this war. Her parents, her books, all the books in Hogwarts, burnt to dust, and her best friends. Fat tears rolled down her cheeks as she listened to Mrs. Weasley mourning her son. In the distance, she heard someone calling for Ron, but of course, he'd never come back. _

_Maybe it wouldn't have been so painful if at least Harry had made it out alive, but now he was gone too and while Voldemort was indeed defeated, neither Hermione nor the rest of the wizarding world felt there was much to celebrate. _

_Once they had lowered Ron's casket into the ground and the first shovel of dirt had been thrown in, Hermione stepped up to the hole and let fall a locket on top of the dirt. Soon, it too would be buried. She let out one last sob before turning her back on her two best friends forever._


End file.
